360 degree feedback is a process of comparing self-perceptions of skills, performance or personality attributes to those of others who work closely with the individual. The invited feedback typically comes from direct reports/subordinates, peers, colleagues, managers in the organisational hierarchy and in some cases external sources such as customers and suppliers or other interested stakeholders. The goal of 360 degree feedback is to enhance awareness of one's strengths and potential developmental opportunities to increase personal or team effectiveness. The term "360" refers to the 360 degrees in a circle, an all round view, and 360 degree feedback is also known as multi-rater feedback.
Back to TopMost, but not all, 360 degree feedback processes tend to compare self-perceptions of skills, effectiveness or performance to others who have had a chance to work with the individual. It is possible, but less common, to also utilize a 360 degree feedback process measuring personality or style. Some organisations find value in combining a skill based 360 degree feedback process with a separate personality or style instrument in their coaching and training programs. Personality and style, measuring underlying motives, can help explain why someone might behave as they do, whereas 360 degree feedback provides a more complete picture about how one's behavior is being perceived by others.
Back to Top360 degree feedback can support performance appraisal systems but should cautiously be directly linked to remuneration. The generation of an individual performance development plan can be a strategic part of most performance appraisal systems and should be considered to support employee growth and career development.
Back to TopNot all organizations are "ready" to utilize 360 degree feedback systems or the time it is introduced is not optimum to ensure success. For example, it is not recommended to introduce a 360 degree feedback process in the middle of a very large organizational change (e.g., merger or acquisition). 360 degree feedback systems should be piloted by a willing stakeholder or group that is open to giving and receiving feedback. Often, the use of feedback between one's manager and employee only is a wonderful way to softly introduce the benefits of 360 degree feedback to the organization. Finally, 360 degree feedback processes should be used to solve real business needs - in this way it is introduced as a solution to improving leadership effectiveness or team building.
Back to TopCurrent research on "best practice" in the use of 360 degree feedback suggests that you can optimize results if you utilize the following principles:
Use caution in utilizing 360 degree feedback processes under the following situations:
It typically has a development focus
Most 360 degree feedback processes share a common time line. The recommended process below will give you an idea of how long each step in rolling out a complete 360 degree feedback process might take:
Given that people need time to make change, and then time for that change to be seen by others we recommend that somewhere between 6 and 18 month intervals are most appropriate. This allows people to work through their development and action plans to create change.
Back to TopTo gain appropriate and balanced feedback, participants should choose respondents based on:
You need only one person who would be specific, candid and totally accurate. However, since we often can't identify this "special" one person we tend to use a sampling approach to asking for feedback. We need a critical mass of feedback to have confidence that how others perceive and experience us is how most people do-not just our strongest supporters or critics. Some limited research suggests that validity of feedback can be maximized by asking 8 to 12 raters, if possible, in each rater category you use (e.g., peers, team members, direct reports).
Back to TopWe suggest that employees should be with an organization approximately 6-9 months before participating in a 360 degree feedback process. First impressions can often be erroneous and not very useful for developmental planning processes.
Back to TopIt is a good practice to notify invited raters that you are participating in a 360 degree feedback process and you are interested in their candid and specific comments and perceptions to help you to improve and grow. This communication often helps motivate raters to be candid and want to participate in the 360 degree feedback process.
Back to TopMany vendors utilize an "anonymity protection" process to ensure that enough raters have completed the online questionnaire to ensure confidentiality. If needed, participants can be encouraged to invite additional raters or the few that have responded can be categorized and grouped with others to allow for their feedback and input to be included in the summary feedback report.
Back to TopIn most 360 degree feedback processes used for developmental purposes, usually the participant is the only person who gets to keep a copy of their individual summary feedback report. In some cases, the report might be made available to an internal or external coach the participant is working with or a trainer/facilitator who is conducting an organizational workshop. It is typical for talent management/succession planning purposes that a copy of the feedback report might also be made available to one's manager or Human Resources.
Back to TopIn general 360 degree feedback questionnaires should be targeted and contain relevant questions. They should be long enough to accurately measure the competencies they are attempting to assess (reliability) but not too long as to decrease motivation to complete them. As a general guide it takes, on average, between 30-60 seconds to answer each question and if a respondent is asked to complete on a number of people it's important that respondent fatigue doesn't set in. Typically, 360 degree feedback questionnaires contain between 40 and 70 items.
Back to TopNot necessarily. Well designed and psychometrically sound (reliable and valid) off-the-shelf 360 degree feedback questionnaires (such as those available from ConsultingTools) can be used effectively if the behaviors are all relevant. If behaviors are not relevant to the organization, then completing the 360 degree feedback questionnaire could be difficult and not give you the results you are looking for. A customized 360 degree feedback questionnaire can be useful if designed to fit your exact needs and support organizational competency frameworks or development objectives.
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Confidentiality is an important aspect of 360 degree feedback to both participants and respondents to ensure everyone participates and feels able to answer honestly and candidly. If there are any doubts around confidentiality then people will feel anxious about completing and unsure of the purpose of the 360 degree feedback process and the use of the data.
If respondents are not guaranteed that their responses are anonymous they may not provide accurate responses (in fact, research suggests that ratings are inflated when raters do not perceive their input is anonymous). To ensure confidentiality it can help to have a neutral person administrating the 360 degree feedback process, either Optima360 as an external processor or an in-house human resources representative.
All online questionnaire data collected is encrypted, and unique passwords are assigned through Optima360's web-based system and data stored on a secure server.
There are many different types of reliability and validity. Ideally, a customized questionnaire should have established scale reliability (e.g., Cronbach's alpha) to ensure that the questions are accurately measuring a single concept. It would also be useful to know whether the customized questionnaire had acceptable test re-test reliability.
Validity is also important for 360 degree feedback questionnaires. There are many different types of "validity" so it is easy to be confused when someone says that their 360 degree feedback tool is "valid." Minimally, a customized questionnaire should have "face validity" so that participants and raters tend to believe that the questions and competencies are relevant to the purpose and goals of the feedback process.
It is possible to establish face validity by running a focus group with a representative group from within your organization, or by piloting the 360 degree feedback questionnaire before a wider roll-out. It is important to establish whether the 360 degree feedback behaviors are clear and can be answered, that the questionnaire itself is relevant to those individual's participating in the 360 degree feedback project and that all of the organization's key competencies are being measured.
Other kinds of validity that should be considered in the development of a customized 360 degree feedback assessment include criterion related validity (does the customized instrument actually predict anything meaningful like performance?) and convergent/divergent validity (does the customized instrument correlate with like/dislike measures?).
Writing good behavioral statements for a customized 360 feedback assessment is critical to ensure that what is being measured is accurate and useful for developmental purposes. Here are some recommended tips to ensure your questions are specific, behavioral and useful:
To maintain reliability you should ensure that you have a minimum of 3 behaviors for each defined competency.
Back to TopMost 360 degree feedback assessments use one of four different types of rating scales:
Effectiveness scales ask participants and raters to provide judgments about how "effective" the individual demonstrates specific competencies and underlying behaviors. Potential scales are more commonly used for succession planning systems and ask respondents to predict how well the participant might perform in the future or what potential they have to succeed.
Ranking scales typically ask raters to compare to some type of standard (e.g., evaluate the participant compared to the most effective leader that he/she has experienced within their organization). Frequency scales typically ask about how often the participant has demonstrated or expressed specific behaviors.
A Likert type scale of at least 5 points should be used to give an adequate spread of response. An "Unable to answer" or "Not applicable" response can also be included.
Typical survey response scales can be found in the Resources section.
Research suggests that behavior change efforts are difficult for all of us (e.g., 95% of those who lose weight regain it back within 2 years; only 14% of those who quit smoking are abstinent after 6 months; improvement after 360 feedback after feedback typically only occurs in 50% of supervisors who receive it) and unless we commit to practicing new behaviors we are unlikely to improve our effectiveness and performance. Talent Accelerator® was designed to help facilitate translation of awareness from our assessments into actual behavior change through the creation and implementation of action plans.
Back to TopYes. The design of Talent Accelerator® was based on the most often applied theories of individual behavior change including the Theory of Planned Behavior (Ajzen, 1991), self-efficacy and social cognitive theory (Bandura, 1977), the Health Belief Model (Becker, 1974), and the Transtheoretical Model of Change (TTM;
Back to TopThe use of coaching along with assessments appears in several research studies to facilitate enhanced effectiveness. For example, Smither et al., (2003) studied 1,361 senior managers who received 360-degree feedback with 404 of these managers working exclusively with an executive coach to review their feedback and set individual goals. Managers who worked with an executive coach were significantly more likely than the other managers to demonstrate improvement. Thatch (2002) tracked 281 executives participating in a six-month coaching and multi-rater feedback intervention and found the combination of multi-rater feedback and individual coaching increased leadership effectiveness up to 60%.
Back to TopInitiating behavior change and sustaining it over time are really two different processes. Talent Accelerator® builds in specific exercises and has a reminder system in place to help people move through the three stages of successful behavior change plans: 1) Enlighten (awareness about "signature" strengths and potential development areas); 2) Encourage (readiness, confidence and motivation to want to create and implement an action plan); and 3) Enable (periodically reminding and reinforcing leaders about their development plan progress).
Back to TopTalent Accelerator® facilitates greater understanding of the feedback by including a set of structured exercises designed to facilitate awareness and insight. These exercises include a set of reflective questions for the leader to consider about their results, rating of the most important competencies being measured for successful performance in their current job, and a decision making approach to deciding which specific competencies they are most motivated to want to work on as part of their development plan.
Back to TopYes. One feature of Talent Accelerator® is a journal that leaders can keep during their coaching and professional developmental planning experience. The content can be either kept totally private or open to be shared with an internal/external coach or one's manager through Coach Accelerator.
Back to TopAn electronic copy of the assessment used is available within Talent Accelerator® when you enter into the system.
Back to TopNo-coaching combined with Talent Accelerator® appears to have the greatest impact on successful behavior change efforts. However, Talent Accelerator® was developed to be easy to use, intuitive and could be a self-directed for use by leaders within an organization or for one's own professional development.
Back to TopBy clicking on the "Coaches" tab within Talent Accelerator® you can invite as many "coaches" as you want to track and monitor your development plan. These "coaches" might be your own supervisor, mentor or internal/external coach you are working with.
Back to TopBy clicking on the "Coaches" tab within Talent Accelerator® you can invite as many "coaches" as you want and determine if they have permission to view your report or not. For example, you might want an external coach you are working with to have full access to your 360 feedback report but not your immediate supervisor or manager.
Back to TopEach coach you invite to partner with you will access a separate site called Coach Accelerator and they will have full access to the exact same competency based resource library as you.
Back to TopEnvisia Learning is committed to making sure only the most useful and updated resources are available to support leader's development. With the use of staff, the resource library is updated each week to add, delete and modify new and existing links, books, podcasts, and other media that are available to be added.
Back to TopYou can feel free to add any resource you want to your development plan. If you think that this resource would be useful for others, please let us know and we can consider adding it to our resource library.
Back to TopMost of the resources available in Talent Accelerator® are free but books and certain articles (Harvard Business Review) must be purchased directly by the publisher by clicking on the link provided.
Back to TopYou can feel free to focus your development effort on any number of competencies or focus areas. In fact, you might complete your development plan on one competency or focus area and want to begin another after that.
Back to TopThere is no limit to the number of developmental activities, tasks, or projects, you include in your plan but realistically having fewer that are specific, measurable and doable are better than a large number that can't be easily tracked or monitored for progress.
Back to TopYes. Once you begin to set up your development plan it will open up the comprehensive library for the particular competency or area you want to work on. Clicking on the box to the left of the resource will open up a calendar for you to complete to allow you to determine a time frame to finish this activity.
Back to TopGenerally, your organization will purchase access to Talent Accelerator® for one year but it can be renewed at any time and no developmental planning information will be deleted or eliminated. You might even want to take another 360 assessment in 12-18 months and use Talent Accelerator® to create a new set of developmental actions and plans to help enhance your growth and effectiveness.
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